I am grateful that the Guardian gives space to Simon Jenkins’s warning of the dangers to democracy evident in Labour’s decision to prevent Jamie Driscoll’s re-selection as Labour’s candidate for North of Tyne mayor (Keir Starmer says he wants to empower local communities. The Jamie Driscoll affair suggests otherwise, 5 June), and to Aditya Chakrabortty’s description of this as McCarthyism (Notes on a scandal: this is how Starmer’s bullies took out Jamie Driscoll – and why it matters, 8 June).
In more than half a century of Labour party membership, I have seen gains by both the right and the left, and while there was no “golden age” of party democracy, I cannot recall a time when it was held in such disregard.
